
Gang Active For 6 Yrs, Stayed In Dubai For 45 Days During IPL, Say Cops
Lucknow: The alleged mastermind of a cricket betting racket that took close interest in the IPL and operated out of Dubai for 45 days during the tournament this summer was arrested along with three of his associates from a flat in Lotus Boulevard in Sector 100 on Saturday.
The betting gang, police said, was being led by Delhi resident Gaurav Gupta (33), who owned a mobile phone shop earlier before starting the racket. His three associates were identified as Dinesh Garg (32) and Ajit Singh (32) of Rajasthan and Nitin Gupta (29), a resident of Vijay Nagar in Ghaziabad.
Police said Gaurav was known as “Tesla 2.0” among his clients. While Dinesh would fix the rates and take care of the accounts, Ajit would interact with the clients through video calls. Nitin, who was hired as a driver, soon scaled up the ranks and offered technical support to the gang.
Harish Chander, the Noida DCP, said they received a tip-off about the gang operating out of a 3BHK flat in the society and acted on it. The gang, he said, had placed bets in the last cricket match between Pakistan and Afghanistan on Thursday.
“They would fix rates on every ball, over, century and half century. But the maximum amount was fixed on the team that would win the match. In a day, around 70 people could place bets with them,” the officer said.
In April this year — when the IPL was being played — the gang went to Dubai and operated out of there for 45 days, Chander said.
“They had downloaded various applications like Supreme TV, Bullet 24, Cricket Line and so on. They had a system that allowed them to take several calls at the same time and would also interact with their clients via Zoom. If they felt they were losing a huge bet, they would disconnect the call and go incommunicado,” the DCP said.
Rajneesh Verma, ACP-1, said Gaurav formed his own group in 2017. “He was known as Tesla 2.0 among other gang members and his clients. They would earlier operate from a house in Shahdara. On August 1, they took this 3BHK flat at Lotus Boulevard on a monthly rent of Rs 50,000. The landlord hadn’t got the verification done for his tenants. He will face action as well,” he added.
The gang, Verma said, had procured several SIM cards through fake documents. During the raid on Saturday, the cops recovered foreign currency worth Rs 9 lakh and around 4 lakh in Indian rupees. Six bank accounts linked to the gang were seized. Collectively, they had Rs 13 lakh in them.
An FIR was registered against the four at Sector 39 police station under sections 420 (cheating), 467 (forgery), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 468 (forgery), 471 (using as genuine a forged document) and 469 (forgery for purpose of harming reputation) of the IPC and relevant provisions of the IT Act. They were produced in court and remanded in judicial custody.